Gareth Thomas
MP for Harrow West · Labour (Co-op) · United Kingdom
“Local councils such as Harrow need to invest more in youth facilities that divert young people away from crime. Some of the CCTV projects in my constituency that Harrow council has turned down—in Wealdstone, south Harrow and central Harrow—should get funding.”
“I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Pendle and Clitheroe (Jonathan Hinder) on securing the debate and on the way in which he approached the subject. I join him and my hon.”
“I also want to suggest that the Metropolitan police does not get recognition across the whole of the UK for its hugely important work in tackling national and international crime, and that perhaps more recognition of that is required in the funding formula.”
“In particular, in Harrow, we recently saw enforcement teams contracted out to an organisation called Kingdom. The responsibility for that contract was with Harrow council. There was widespread criticism of the way some of the staff employed by Kingdom tried to levy fines on a number of young people in south Harrow, in my constituency.”
“One way we can further support the Metropolitan police is by allowing it to keep more of the proceeds from successful operations, such as recovering stolen funds hidden in bitcoin assets. I congratulate my hon.”
“Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has done a huge amount to try to redirect funding from other parts of his budget to minimise the impact of that cut.”
The complete record
Every one of 7,011 lines we hold for Gareth Thomas, in date order, each linked to its source. Free to read, in full, without an account. Page 80 of 141.
“I apologise for the discourtesy of missing the Minister’s opening remarks. He mentioned other multilateral development banks. How does he see the new bank operating with the Asian Development Bank? One would think, instinctively, that there was some overlap or, if not, that there would be some sort of memorandum of understanding between the two. Does the Minister envisage that?”
“The Minister is aware that Mr Jin Liqun was appointed as the secretary-general of the multilateral interim secretariat of the new bank. Was Britain consulted on the appointment? Is it a genuinely interim one and, if so, will Britain be involved in the interviews for the permanent head of the bank?”
“My hon. Friend makes an important point, not least because the history of Chinese infrastructure aid to many developing countries, important as it has undoubtedly been, has often involved Chinese labourers effectively being imported into the country where the infrastructure is being built as a quid pro quo for the investment. Surely we need to ensure that that cannot be achieved as part of the investment we are potentially committing to this bank.”
“It would be a tragedy if British investment in the new bank was inadvertently to reinforce through infrastructure spending the denial of human rights to particular groups in Sri Lanka.”
“Will Britain have a dedicated official and a team to support them, as we do at the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank, who will be able to go through the fine print of each proposed investment and pick through whether the environmental and social safeguards that the bank eventually signs up to are met in full? Will there be a process by which Britain and others can raise human rights concerns, if there are any, about particular infrastructure projects? I ask that in the context of Sri Lanka, a country that certainly needs significant multilateral investment—the Chinese have been showing considerable interest in providing that—but where significant human rights concerns remain, particularly in the north and the east.”
“It would be good to hear a bit more about the structure of the proposed bank. Will there be a series of vice-presidents? Which countries does the Minister expect will provide the heads of the bank? Is this perhaps an opportunity for another Member from Nottingham to take up a position in the international development world? Is there a chance for Britain to hold one of the vice-presidencies of the new bank, given our significant contribution? On staffing, given the scale of the spending that this multilateral development bank will presumably be able to make—very large sums of money will be committed to very large infrastructure projects—what will be the governance arrangements for those projects?”
“The Americans always get to pick the head of the World Bank; the Europeans always get to pick the head of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development; and it is usually a Japanese national who gets chosen to be the head of the Asian Development Bank. There is therefore a sense that this new multilateral development bank is on the horizon partly because the Chinese want their own bank that they can control. That suspicion is fed by the appointment of Mr Jin Liqun, who seems to be the de facto chief executive of the new bank. I look to the Minister to give a fuller answer on whether he is there for a short or a long period, whether there will be interviews and whether Britain will be on the interview panel. There is usually a series of vice-presidents to handle particular parts of a multilateral development bank’s portfolio.”
“The people of Harrow West have always been interested in multilateral development banks, and they will certainly be interested in this new addition to the family. I want to pick up where my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North left off. One recognises the global Realpolitik that has clearly influenced the Prime Minister’s enthusiasm for contributing to this new bank, but one hopes that the Minister and his colleagues in the Department for International Development will, as my hon. Friend suggested, start to ask much tougher questions than those that the Minister suggested in the part of his opening remarks that I was able to hear are being asked. Multilateral development banks have always been a cosy club.”
“Sadly, there was often little opportunity in the House to debate the work of the multilateral development banks. All too often, debate took place only when major funding decisions were being announced. Can the Minister set out whether there will be a change in that regard? Given that it is a new institution, early scrutiny on the Floor of the House might be important. Finally, the AIIB released draft environmental and social safeguards. A series of NGOs have expressed concern about those safeguards, and it would be useful to hear from the Minister whether Britain has taken any of them up and whether there have been any reforms of and improvements to the draft guidelines.”
“It would be helpful to know whether that commentary, which was issued at the end of June this year, is still accurate, or whether there have been changes to the byelaws. It would be a concern if we were simply to pump money into the organisation with the Chinese having a veto over all the big decisions, particularly if we had significant concerns about spending going forward. The previous Labour Government were pushing for reform of the processes for appointing the heads of multilateral development banks. I do not know whether the right hon. Gentleman carried on that work, but it would be good to hear from him on that subject. The Committee and the whole House are entitled to hear what reassurance the Minister can give us on this crucial matter.”
“I am grateful for my hon. Friend pointing out to me that Sutton Coldfield is slightly further away from Nottingham than I had initially realised. Being from London, we are sometimes a bit hazy about the distances between constituencies north of Watford. Indeed, the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield might be an excellent potential vice-president if the Foreign Office was willing to fight for him to get such a post. Perhaps the first thing would be to know whether Britain will have a chance of nominating one of the deputies or vice-presidents to that role. As I was alluding to, some of the commentary about the new bank has pointed out that its byelaws require a 75% super-majority for major decisions. That will effectively give China a de facto veto on personnel and policy decisions.”
“Is the Minister aware of any non-Chinese candidates for the permanent position heading the bank? Why does the Treasury have the policy lead? Given that DFID has responsibility for multilateral development banks, why has this particular bank been taken out of its control?”
“With respect, the question of the hon. Member for Gloucester is perfectly reasonable. Where will the bank be headquartered? The Minister must know that. The Chancellor of the Exchequer must have agreed that as part of the agreement on our contribution.”
“I agree with my hon. Friend’s argument on income tax. Might the full suite of property taxes, not just business rates, also be worth considering in this context? I draw his attention to my amendment, clearly not as well drafted as his, suggesting that property taxes should be devolved in full to London. I hope to catch Mrs Main’s eye and say a few words on that later.”
“Is not a further argument for local taxes being controlled at local level that it allows local government a full range of policy responses to deal with local problems? I offer the example—I hope to catch your eye on this later, Mrs Main—of the housing crisis in London, where an ability to impose higher taxes on empty homes might be one part of the solution to the housing crisis.”
“My hon. Friend’s point about poorer areas and the full devolution of business rates is apposite. Is the Chancellor’s suggestion to axe completely the revenue support grant for local authorities—that was in the same speech as plans for the full devolution of business rates—likely to have a dramatic impact on increasing inequality of income between areas? Will my hon. Friend’s Committee be considering that?”
“It is the scale of the housing crisis that provides the overarching rationale for this new clause. We have seen a huge drop in owner-occupation in London. An average home in London costs nine times the average wage of a police officer, 21 times the average wage of a chef and 35 times the wage of a Foreign Office cleaner. Rents have rocketed, and are not expected to bottom out any time soon. Homelessness has also increased rapidly: there has been a 50% increase in my own borough over the past five years. Meanwhile, Ministers—and I say this with all due respect to the Minister who is present—sit on their hands doing very little about a crisis which, given that we are building fewer than half the homes a year that London needs, is likely to become more rather than less acute unless radical steps are taken.”
“Such control would not only enable London to plan infrastructure projects better, but allow greater scope to ensure that the property taxes that are levied suit London’s property and land markets. For example, the introduction of a hotel occupancy tax, as successfully levied in New York, could raise up to £50 million a year for London. Even if the Minister is not minded to support my new clause 11 at this juncture, he might give some indication of being tempted to develop a feeling of courage in taking on the Treasury and advocate further devolution of more property taxes to London. New clause 10 devolves responsibility for housing law to the Mayor and Assembly. That matches arrangements for Scotland and Wales and would allow Londoners themselves to decide whether to extend the right to buy and whether or not to cut rents.”
“Given the pressures that London’s rapidly growing population is creating for further investment in infrastructure, it is vital for big infrastructure decisions to be brought to resolution more quickly and for the control of property and taxation to be exercised at London-wide levels, which would increase the Mayor’s ability—and, indeed, that of local councils—to put the financing together for the infrastructure schemes necessary for the future. Greater control over property taxes would ease the borrowing constraints on London’s local councils so that they could invest in vital infrastructure such as affordable housing. As the London Finance Commission set out, London currently controls only 7% of the taxes that are paid here, compared with more than 50% in New York. Property taxes are set locally in Paris, Berlin, Madrid and Tokyo.”
“I thus support the instinct to retain 100% of business rates, but it is the full devolution of all property taxes that is needed to help us in London to tackle our challenges, with a pound-for-pound reduction in London’s revenue support grant as the quid pro quo going forward. There is widespread support among the business community for the devolution of property taxes because that community recognises that it is key to developing the necessary infrastructure to promote economic growth. I use as my example the 40 years it has taken to start work on Crossrail.”
“There should also be a corresponding reduction in grant income to London to ensure that devolution of property taxes is fiscally neutral to the Treasury. My point, however, is that London needs to control more of the wealth that we create to solve the challenges that our city faces. We have the most severe housing crisis of any part of the UK, the highest cost of living, and the starkest levels of inequality. Our transport infrastructure is under huge pressure, and we have stubbornly high levels of child poverty and deprivation. I say that not in any way to dispute the fact that other parts of the UK face significant challenges as well, but merely to underline the argument that London needs to be able to control more of the levers to shape our responses to these challenges.”
“That commission recommended that the full sweep of property taxes—not just business rates, but council tax, stamp duty, capital gains, property development tax and the annual tax on enveloped dwellings—should be devolved to London. High property prices in London mean that the capital contributes a disproportionate amount to the Treasury through property taxes. Last year alone, some £3 billion was paid in stamp duty in London—40% of the total, more than was paid in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland put together. It is right that much of the wealth generated in London is redistributed around the UK. There should be continuing equalisation measures, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) rightly said, perhaps through the revenue support grant or other means.”
“I hesitate to commend him more fully, in case it damages his career, but I am encouraged that the Labour Front-Bench team recognise the need to argue quickly for more devolution to London. I hope to persuade him and the Committee that my new clauses contain the substance of what needs to be devolved to London. The substance of new clause 11, referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), secured cross-party support in London as a result of the London Finance Commission, which Tony Travers chaired and which was established by the Mayor of London, the hon. Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson).”
“I rise to make the case for new clauses 10 and 11, which stand in my name, but first, I should preface my comments by supporting the remarks of my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Mr Allen) about a constitutional settlement. That is an entirely sensible way forward. I do not know whether he has considered the distinctiveness of London as part of that settlement, but I think that any such convention should recognise its difference, the scale of the challenges facing it and the significant contribution it makes to the wealth of the UK as a whole. I read new clause 22, debated in the previous group, with interest, and I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Croydon North (Mr Reed), whom I understand was its genesis.”
“I am grateful to the Minister for his smooth words. I gently suggest that his argument against the further devolution of property taxes as distortionary does not fit with his argument for devolving business rates, which will arguably be just as distortionary, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Durham (Mr Jones) said. There seems to be a slight lack of consistency in the Minister’s position, which may be because of what the Treasury has bequeathed him. I encourage him to go back to the Treasury and press it further before Report.”
“Let me take the right hon. Gentleman back to the subject raised by the right hon. Member for Wokingham (John Redwood)—the issue of where the money comes from to finance devolution. The Secretary of State will be aware of the work of the current Mayor championing full fiscal devolution for London—not just of business rates, but of a series of other local property taxes. Why has the Chancellor resisted devolving control of those additional property taxes?”
“Charming as the Secretary of State might be, he nevertheless gave wind to the prejudice that lurks in one or two minds outside London that the capital has all the power and all the wealth. I know that my hon. Friend is bigger than that. Will he therefore acknowledge that, in the face of an acute housing crisis, Londoners recognise that more devolution needs to be given to the Mayor and the London Assembly so that we can properly tackle that crisis? For example, might my hon. Friend support an amendment to the Bill that would give London the same opportunities to control housing legislation that Scotland and Wales currently have?”
“Londoners are broadly comfortable with the originally established system of devolution in London, but one thing they look enviously at in Scotland is the power to control and shape housing policy. Would the SNP look sympathetically on an amendment from London Back Benchers seeking to give that power to London?”
“Targets for percentages of new-build schemes given over to sheltered housing or social rent ought to sit in one place, enabling one body or one figure to develop a clear, holistic strategy for housing in London. At the moment, the Mayor has his hand on some of the levers, but for too many others it is to Whitehall that he has to go, and not just to one Whitehall Department but to a number of Departments. I gently suggest that that needs to change. I hope to table a probing amendment to test the appetite of the House on devolving legislative power on housing to the London Assembly.”
“Many in the House will be familiar with the development of London’s infrastructure, which has too often been characterised, particularly on the big projects, by lengthy delays. In part, that has been driven by the number of players involved in decision making, not least in central Government. London should be given the tools in full to tackle our housing crisis in particular. Through the Mayor and the London Assembly, it should be given the right to legislate on London housing matters. Legislative power over housing was devolved to Scotland in 1998 and to Wales in 2011. I simply ask the House why London, where the crisis is so acute, should not have the same powers: judgment on control of rents, on whether right to buy should be extended, on levels of property tax, and on funding for new affordable housing.”
“I say that not to minimise the argument for further devolution in the north, Cornwall or elsewhere, but rather to underline the scale of the challenges currently facing London. London’s population is bigger than that of Scotland or Wales, yet it does not have power to tackle the—at times breathtaking—levels of poverty and inequality. London is growing by more than 100,000 people a year, and it is expected to do so for at least the next decade, bringing with it range of additional challenges that are not replicated to the same degree elsewhere in England. The housing crisis in London is bad now, but it is only likely to get worse without substantial extra devolution.”
“It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Hertford and Stortford (Mr Prisk) and my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer). Like them, I strongly support the move towards more devolution, but we should not get misty-eyed about metro mayors or local government in general. We are now—rightly, perhaps—sceptical about centralised decision-making from Whitehall, and in that spirit I think that the provocative scepticism of those on the Opposition Front Bench is right. I am entirely comfortable with the thrust of the Bill, although I think there are some omissions, the biggest of which relates to London. London is different from the rest of England in terms of the scale of appetite and need for further devolution.”
“There is a justification for having a referendum in London to consider the extension of powers: we had one when we set up the Mayor and the Assembly. If there is to be further substantial devolution then there is certainly a case to be made for a referendum to cement mayoral and Assembly authority over those additional powers. Another area for London ought to be full fiscal devolution. I welcome the announcement on business rates, but I am afraid that does not go far enough. All property taxes should be devolved. The all-party consensus of the mayoral London Finance Commission report published in 2013 was for a pound-for-pound reduction in revenue support grant as the quid pro quo that London offers back. It remains opaque at best on why the Treasury will not agree not just to business rates but to additional property taxes to London.”
“The Assembly ought to be able to scrutinise the heads of major public utilities—such as water, electricity, gas, National Rail and broadband providers—on their London work programmes and on how Londoners will be affected by their decisions, in the same way that the Assembly is able to scrutinise other crucial services, such as policing and transport. I commend the case for further devolution to London and hope to probe this issue with the Government in due course.”
“I urge the Minister and the Secretary of State to use their influence with the Chancellor to encourage him to go even further down the line of fiscal devolution. There is also a question about the living wage. Why does that need to be controlled by the Treasury? Why should the decision not be set, after consultation with business, by local people? There could perhaps be a local minimum set by national Government, with the actual rate determined by at regional level by local decision makers. I again draw the attention of the House to London, where a living wage and a living income would be very different from that in other parts of the UK. If there is to be a further devolution of powers to London—I hope there will be—we need to consider stronger scrutiny powers for the London Assembly.”
“My hon. Friend is, as ever, ahead of me. I share his view that in time—particularly if there are substantial additional public services responsibilities devolved to London, not least the extra powers, alluded to by my hon. Friend the Member for Blackley and Broughton (Graham Stringer), relating to healthcare—there would be a case for more control à la Scotland, certainly the ability in the current settlement to vary levels of income tax. Why should London or Nottingham not be able to impose new additional levies—for example, a tourist levy that many other big world cities, such as New York, can impose? It is striking that in London business has strongly supported the devolution to local control of all property taxes, not just business rates. They see it as essential to speed up infrastructure development.”
“I commend the hon. Gentleman on his speech and I very much share his view that there should be an independent UN investigation. He said that he thought there were four specific things that the British Government could do. May I suggest to him that there is a fifth? It is that the British Government, perhaps through some of their funding from the Foreign Office to human rights organisations, could continue to shine a light on the human rights abuses that are still ongoing in the north and east of Sri Lanka. And in that regard, I draw his attention to a report by the Colin Powell School for Civic and Global Leadership in the US on the situation that Tamil women face. There continues to be a huge problem in terms of sexual harassment and, as the hon. Gentleman alluded to, rape, as much now as there has been in the past.”
“With 40,000 of the extra jobs that a third runway would generate set to be in London, and given that Sir Howard Davies has looked in detail at the environmental concerns that were raised with him and is clear that they can be addressed, quite apart from the national interest, will the Secretary of State accept that it is certainly in London's interest for a third runway to go ahead?”
“I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman, my Harrow neighbour, for giving way. He is making an interesting argument and, similarly, I hope that North Harrow library can be kept open. I think he went a tad too far in suggesting that the Government cannot be held to account at all, given that potentially Harrow Council will be hit with £83 million of cuts over a four-year period. That inevitably means that, on the tough decisions that it has to make, it is between a rock and a hard place.”
“I agree with what the Minister has said thus far. Given his comments about the future of libraries, does his Department have any sort of library modernisation fund that could be accessed by those who are trying to turn North Harrow library in my constituency, which the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) referred to, into a community library, to help move things forward?”
“Were North Harrow community library—supported, I am sure, by Harrow Council—to put in a bid to the lottery fund for some of the £6 million pot that the Minister alluded to, and to write to him with the details, would he be willing to consider writing in support of that request for finance?”
“May I ask the Prime Minister about another area of the public services: funding for the police? Can he confirm that the Metropolitan Police Service faces further significant cuts in its funding, potentially leading to the loss of between 5,000 and 10,000 police officer positions?”
“We simply cannot take that length of time to decide whether Crossrail 2 should go ahead. London needs to be able to respond more quickly to the infrastructure challenges our city faces if we are to secure its continued prosperity and status as the greatest city on earth. I share the view that London’s property taxes should be devolved to London’s government. Indeed, London generates a higher percentage of total income from property taxes than any other region of the UK. The House will be aware that London would still be making a greater than proportionate contribution to the Exchequer via corporation tax revenues, VAT revenues and other crucial areas of national income. Devolving property taxes would be a first step towards what should be a radical devolution package for London.”
“In New York, more than 50% is retained by New York’s mayor. Other cities of comparable size to London can set their own taxes, yet London cannot. Madrid, Paris, Tokyo, Berlin, Frankfurt and New York can all set property taxes. Paris, for example, can set a property tax on developed and undeveloped land. New York can determine land taxes, a hotel occupancy tax and a commercial business tax. The London Finance Commission made the powerful point that, if London has more control over its taxes and the ability to borrow, it will be better able to tackle impediments to further economic growth, never mind to tackle other key issues in our city. Crossrail was first suggested in the 1940s. It was first formally proposed after an inquiry in 1974, but it has taken more than 40 years since then to start serious building work.”
“In the next decade, London will see an additional 1 million citizens needing somewhere to live, needing to use public services—schools, GPs and hospitals—and looking for work. Our transport system needs significant investment now, never mind in future years. Those pressures demand increased public investment and of course private sector investment, too. Inequality and poverty are starker in London than in any other region or nation of the UK. I say that not to diminish the scale of both in other parts of the UK, but merely to underline the seriousness of the challenges in London. I supported the recommendations of the London Finance Commission. It concluded that London needs fewer borrowing constraints and greater devolved tax powers. At the moment, London retains little more than 7% of all the tax paid by London residents and businesses.”
“Much of the wealth that is created in London is rightly redistributed to other regions and nations. I agree with that in principle, but I also believe that London deserves more in return, and that Londoners deserve a better quality of life. We have the highest cost of living in the UK. The housing crisis is at its most acute in London. We have the highest rents and the most expensive homes to buy. In 2005, the average home in London cost £274,000. Ten years on, it is £465,000. Earnings have not doubled, but costs almost have. That is the reality for Londoners. The ratio of rents to earnings is higher in London than in any other region or nation of the UK. Owning property is now out of reach for most Londoners.”
“I believe strongly that London must be part of that journey, that it must have its own compass, and that Londoners’ voices must be heard. I welcome the plans in the Queen’s Speech for the devolution of more powers to Scotland, and also the plans to give Britain’s northern cities stronger powers to shape their citizens’ own destiny. We have traditionally seen the Union as consisting of England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. It is time that we recognised that London is a very specific part of that Union. Yes, there are England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, but there is the city state of London as well. London is the centre of wealth creation in the United Kingdom. I recognise that Britain’s wealth has many sources, but London makes proportionally bigger contributions to the UK’s economy than any other UK region or nation.”
“It is, as ever, a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for North East Somerset (Mr Rees-Mogg), who is a provocative parliamentarian in the best of senses. I join him in congratulating the hon. Member for Argyll and Bute (Brendan O’Hara) on his excellent maiden speech. Given its quality, I suspect that he will prove to be a shrewd ally on one or two issues on which the Scottish nationalist and Labour parties will make common cause in the House, but a difficult opponent on many others. I believe that Britain’s future is as a federal Britain, and I believe that we are heading for that destiny now. The journey is happening in a very British way, by means of evolution, and it will look very different in different parts of the United Kingdom; but we must master the route to a federal state, rather than being buffeted by events along the way.”
“I say gently to my hon. Friend, for whom I have considerable respect, that I profoundly disagree. Never mind the Scottish question, the Welsh question or indeed the English question, there is a London question that demands an answer: when will London be able to shape its destiny without always having to go to the man in Whitehall and the man in Downing Street to sort out our great city’s challenges?”
“But for that to happen, Londoners need to be able to lead London’s future.”